Dolphin not recognizing imported GCI

Siesna · 11-30-2011, 01:45 AM #1

I am trying to use a Twilight Princess save I ripped off my gamecube memory card. I have the gci file, I imported it onto a memory card in Dolphin, but whenever I start Twilight Princess, it acts like there is no save present on the memory card. Here is what I did:

I had no .raw memory card file made yet, so I started Twilight Princess and let it "format" the memory card. I went ahead and had it create a game save file. I closed the game, opened the GC Memory Card manager. I opened the .raw file the emulator had made, deleted the Twilight Princess save the game created, and imported the .gci file I ripped from my memory card. It shows correctly in the manager, with the correct title, date, and region. I right clicked and then "Fix Checksums". When I start Twilight Princess, it says it's there is no game save data on the memory card. If I tell it to make new data, it overwrites the data I imported on there, but it will NOT read it. It reads data that it created fine.

I have done any VAST combinations of these steps. I have tried other gci files I downloaded from GameFAQs. Those don't work either. I've tried previous versions of Dolphin. I've tried running as administrator. I've tried running in compatibility mode. I'm STUMPED.

If anyone has any ideas, I would be overjoyed to hear them. Or, if anyone can just take my GCI and put it on a .raw file and send it to me, I would be quite grateful! I'm curious if the program is just not making the .raw file correctly, or if the game isn't reading it correctly.

Thanks in advance!

~~Duke Nukem~~ · 11-30-2011, 01:58 AM #2

Sounds like a thorny problem you have there.
To be honest I haven't used the GC Memory Card Manager for a long time probably not since 2.0. It's well known for destroying data.
I have too been a victim of this but in the end all turned out fine.

You're seem to doing it right, I don't know what's going on here.

What version are you using now?

Siesna · 11-30-2011, 02:06 AM #3

I started with 3.0, then started using the latest 3.0-204 in hopes the newer version would help me. I forgot to add: the only reason I'm using dolphin's manager is every other memory card program I've tried produces .raw files that dolphin will not read at all.

~~Duke Nukem~~ · 11-30-2011, 02:14 AM #4

Oh OK.

Well when I got it to work I did just like you.
Started a game, let it create and format an empty memory card file (MemoryCardA.USA.raw and SRAM.raw)

Then I used the manager to import my saves to the newly formated memory card file.
Started the games and there they were.

Try Dolphin 2.0, that worked for me the last time I used it.

Siesna · 11-30-2011, 02:20 AM #5

I had already tried 2.0 as well. DX I don't know if there's just something about my computer setup that is making this not work right or what. Unfortunately, I do not have another windows computer to try this on, and really don't feel like compiling Dolphin for Linux...

If you wouldn't mind terribly, could you download the gci I attached in my first post and use it to make a memory card and post it back? I would be much appreciative. <3 Like I said, I'm not sure if it's not being made correctly, or not being read correctly. I seem to be doing everything correctly and its still not working. I appreciate you replying regardless. Smile

~~Duke Nukem~~ · 11-30-2011, 02:24 AM #6

Well I could try, but I need to know which region the game is in, because I have the NTSC-U one.

**LordVador** · (This post was last modified: 11-30-2011, 03:14 AM by LordVador.)

It's a PAL savefile. I tried it and couldn't import it. Actually it's imported but the file doesn't appear when playing.
Siesna : try to redump your MC

~~Duke Nukem~~ · 11-30-2011, 03:40 AM #8

OK that's good to know, it would probably ended up like that here too I'm afraid.
Strange that he even can't import GameFaq's saves, I have done that a lot myself without problems.

Siesna · 11-30-2011, 04:54 AM #9

.....That's weird. It's not a PAL save originally. I used GCMM to dump it... I will try again.

But I definitely can't load NTSC saves I downloaded from GameFAQs either. Though I tried so many different things, who knows if I was getting my wires crossed at this point. This was at 2 AM last night. XD

I'll try dumping my file again. I would have tried that sooner.. But it's a pain. Lol

~~Duke Nukem~~ · 11-30-2011, 05:06 AM **#10**

Wait wait hold on, it's not a PAL save originally?
Which version of the game do you own? PAL or NTSC?

If you own the PAL version, a memory card file named MemoryCardA.PAL.raw should be created, if you own the NTSC version of the game it should be MemoryCardA.USA.raw

Importing the wrong region format causes this to happen.
Do you have any other games you could try importing saves with?